


I Forgot to Remember

by MaggieMaybe160



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Episode: s07e17 The Born-Again Identity, Flashbacks, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Making Up, Memories, POV Castiel (Supernatural), Pining, Post-Betrayal, Psychological Torture, Recovered Memories, Sad, Torture, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:01:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27002407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaggieMaybe160/pseuds/MaggieMaybe160
Summary: After taking a roadtrip with a stranger to a mental hospital that's surrounded by demons in the middle of the night, Emmanuel... Castiel... Cas gets his memories back. All of them.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 8
Kudos: 35





	I Forgot to Remember

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bluebell_24](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluebell_24/gifts).



> Thanks to [nicklekeep](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nickelkeep/) and [insominia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/insominia/) my angels who aren't dicks. I love you guys! Thanks for the beta work and cheerleading!

_ “I gather we know each other.” _

The screams of Hell was a sound Castiel could never forget. Or so he thought. He had fought to save Dean Winchester before it was too late. Time had been running out. Dean couldn’t be expected to hold out forever. Castiel had watched as he was torn apart in horrendous ways. He had watched him be reassembled with hooks in his skin and chains around his limbs as guttural, anguished cries erupted from him. He usually called for his brother. Sometimes, he didn’t have any words left, the sounds too terrified and broken to form anything else. 

There was no louder sound than Dean Winchester saying the word “yes” through his teeth to Alastair. He could practically hear the seal break, a lock on a crypt shattering, when Dean sliced the throat of another soul in Hell. He had sobbed as he’d done it, though he might not have known it. And so it was written, so shall it be. The first seal was broken when a righteous man shed blood in Hell. 

Castiel had fought his way to Dean as soon as his superiors had allowed. He shouldn’t have waited for their word. He should have gone when the Hellhounds had ripped through Dean’s chest and dragged him to the depths. He should have gone the first time he was told no, one month into Dean’s eternal sentence. He should have. He could have. He didn’t. 

When Castiel laid his hand on Dean in Hell, he was lost. Heaven’s orders held less meaning. Dean was marked, a handprint seared into his flesh, but also on his soul. One could be healed; the other would tie him to an angel with a profound bond. Castiel was marked too, his true form scarred for eternity. They both had screamed through the fresh pain. Dean Winchester was saved. 

Dean was saved in a hail of demonic bloodshed, the grave dirt pouring down on him as he rose up. He was saved in a spray of glass, Enochian screech, and oppressive uncertainty. He was never meant to feel afraid. It was clear that he did as he covered the inside of the barn with useless sigils, a demon blade at the ready. He lay in wait, legs swinging as he stared at the door that Castiel would walk through. The lightbulbs burst, sparks spraying as the wind that had risen outside threatened to tear the barn to pieces. 

Castiel could have reigned it in for anyone else, but his excitement at meeting Dean Winchester could not be contained. He hadn’t known it was excitement then. He would later learn that it wouldn’t be uncommon for his vessel’s heart to pound, pupils dilate, blood rush, and angelic inhibitions would fail in the presence of Dean. 

It didn’t matter to Castiel that his chest was filled with bullet holes and rock salt. It barely mattered when Dean plunged a demon blade into his chest, the tip of the blade scratching against the fragile heart in his vessel’s chest. He healed it all away before any damage was done. 

Castiel was doomed the moment his eyes looked into Dean’s. Angels can see every color known to every species on every scale. Eventually, it all starts to blend into a messy brownish gray. But Dean’s eyes are green and they are a shade that Castiel had never considered before. He should have allowed it to blend in with the gray to keep himself from drowning in the color, but it was too late. 

Dean’s disbelief and anger filled the room. It was suffocating how deeply a single human could feel. It seemed to permeate the air and embed itself in every surface it touched. Dean didn’t believe in angels, God, or Castiel. He didn’t believe in himself. Castiel spread his wings and let them show and had watched Dean’s green eyes widen. The stench of disbelief changed, and Castiel finally understood the overwhelming feelings that rise up from Hell with the smoke: hopelessness. 

He didn’t believe he deserved to be saved. He still doesn’t. 

_ “You just met yourself. I’ve known you for years.” _

Castiel had woken with no name, no memories, no sense of self, and no purpose. His lungs had protested as he came to, gasping beneath the surface of the water he found himself in. He had managed to make it to the surface and regurgitate the water into the green grass beneath him. Once he could breathe again, a nameless Castiel had stood, his body bare to the elements as he ventured away from the water and into the trees. 

The dirt and stones stuck to his naked feet as he went. The branches of the trees seemed to reach for him, scratching his skin and leaving thin pink lines with beads of blood. The green of the grass and leaves seemed to haunt him, his heartbeat speeding as tears slipped down his cheeks. There was no one and nothing. Not even himself. He had never been more alone, but he didn’t have the memories to know that. It was just a feeling deep in his gut. 

When he tripped, the top few layers of skin on his knees ripped, pain bursting through with the blood. His palms burned with the impact with which he caught himself. He brushed the dirt from his hands after pushing himself back to standing. He wondered if there was anything beyond the thick of trees. There were distant noises, but he had no way of telling what they belonged to. He only knew two things for sure. He was scared and he was alone. 

The woman with red hair and the wrong shade of green eyes had asked him if he was okay. She had asked him his name. She had promised him her help. He had answered that no, he was not okay, and no, he didn’t remember his name. Then he had thanked her and allowed himself to be led out of the forest. 

What were names, really? Emmanuel, a Hebrew name meaning “God is with us,” meant nothing during the time it was used. Humans rarely even know the meanings of the names they are given or they have chosen. Castiel means “Shield of God,” but he never even met God. He was too low a level, too young an angel, too disposable to be worth anything to the absentee father of Heaven. He had even tried to become God, stepping into his place with a belly full of Leviathan and soul power. Only one name means anything to Castiel. Cas. It’s the only name that fits perfectly. It’s the one Dean used. It’s just a shortened version of the name he was given, but it’s his and he had held onto it like the lifeline it was. The lifeline it still is. 

_   
_ _ “Being an angel… It sounds pleasant.” _

The physical body that belonged to Dean Winchester had been in a pine box in a shallow grave in the middle of a forest. Sam Winchester could have done a better job of burying him. He’d dug up enough graves to know just how far deep to bury the coffin, but maybe he had been expecting a miracle such as the one Castiel had performed. The body that belonged to Dean was also in such a state of disarray, Castiel had had to repair it as he returned the soul to its vessel. 

The chest had been torn to shreds by the hellhounds claws and teeth. Hell had sent more than the usual one or two hellhounds to collect him. He had the Winchester name and was too much of a flight risk and a prize to allow for accidents. Lilith had seen to his death personally and Castiel had watched from his perch in Heaven, unable to stop the debt collection on the deal Dean had made a year prior. 

It wasn’t just the broken sternum and ribs, ripped skin, and ruptured organs that had Castiel’s healing abilities working overtime. The body had been decaying without aid from formaldehyde. The flesh and meat had been rotting in a box for four months. If Castiel had allowed Dean to walk out of his grave without the repairs, he surely would have been shot by a zombie movie enthusiast thinking their favorite kind of apocalypse had begun. 

He didn’t have to mend the clothing. The black shirt had been in tatters though. Dean’s soul had been in roughly the same shape. He deserved better. So the blood was washed from his clothing. His shirt became whole again, and Dean’s soul was returned to his newly minted body just as Castiel was called away by his own vessel. 

Castiel had been called away, unable to lift Dean further, leaving him in his grave, but at least he was healed. At least he was saved. 

“Well, I feel stupid doin’ this. But… I’m fresh out of options. So, please. I need some help. I’m prayin’, okay? Please,” Dean Winchester’s voice had called, his voice ringing through Castiel’s being. No sound was louder than Dean’s prayer. Castiel should have expected as much with their obvious bond and growing affection, but he couldn’t have known just how perfect it would feel to have that prayer.

No human or angel knew the feeling. The heart in Castiel’s vessel had begun to race as every color became more vivid, every light brighter and stretching across the darkness. Other noises faded as Dean’s voice took precedence. He hadn’t expected it, but he would cherish it forever. 

It had felt even more impossible to be standing in front of Dean mere seconds after his prayer and the resulting visceral reaction. Prayers make the one who spoke them more. With anyone else, they might simply stand out in the crowd or appear bright in the dark or somehow easier to find. Dean becomes impossible to look away from. His soul shines through. Each freckle creates a map of constellations that becomes imprinted in Castiel’s mind. The green of his eyes captures the color from every blade of grass, every flower stem, every moss patch on a rock, every gemstone of peridot, opal, and jade. His emotions become palpable. At that moment, he had been scared though he lashed out angrily. As soon as Castiel had given him the answer for which he sought, the fear had dissipated and relief had flooded the empty parking lot in which they stood. 

Before that moment, Castiel had never been more aware of the pull he felt to Dean and how unangelic it had felt. How blasphemous and worthy a feeling. How truly intoxicating and addicting Dean was and would always remain to Castiel. 

Dean had been beaten into the ground. He kneeled before the unmarked grave of his brother in mourning. The battle was over, his brother in Hell with Lucifer, the portal closed. One eye was swollen shut. His jaw was severely broken, along with his nose and one cheekbone. Blood dribbled from his nose, streaked down his face from the deep laceration on his eyebrow, and dripped from his lips. Castiel could heal all of that, but he couldn’t heal the hurt in his heart. 

“Cas, you’re alive?” Hope and something else that Castiel couldn’t quite place glittered in Dean’s eye as he looked up at him. When Castiel pressed his fingers to Dean’s forehead and took the physical damage away, he was left with wanting to do more. He had yearned to kneel in front of Dean and offer him comfort, but he knew it wouldn’t be accepted. “Cas, are you God?” 

He’d been surprised to find he smiled at the compliment as warmth spread through him. “That’s a nice compliment, but no.” He’s just Castiel— Cas to Dean and a few others. And with that, maybe he had healed just a piece of the emotional anguish Dean had felt. With a smile, with a touch, with the confirmation that he was still the same old angel who was more guardian than soldier. 

“Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray to Castiel to get his feathery ass down here. ...Cas! Don’t be a dick. We got ourselves a… plague-like situation down here and… do you… do you copy?” 

Dean had been with Lisa for over a year. Cas had been spying, invisible to the man he knew he had feelings he had no right to feel. He watched over him, a dutiful guardian angel, no matter how bad it hurt. But for the first time in a long time, with purpose, Dean’s voice had reached out to him in prayer. 

Dean prayed more often than he realized. When he had nightmares, twisting and turning in his sheets, unable to be soothed, he would cry out for Cas. And Castiel would come. He would race to him, his wings beating against time and space to be at his side, invisible or not, to soothe him and make sure his demons were killed, be them nightmares or real. Dean probably didn’t mean to pray to Castiel all the times he took midnight walks, made a late lunch when he was home alone, or the time he was the parent on duty when Ben had to stay home from school with the stomach flu. But Castiel came every time. He will always come when he calls. 

But this was different. It was the first time in over a year he needed Castiel to appear physically. It was the first time in too long it was meant with purpose, classic rock references and rude nicknames included. Castiel had never been more conflicted. He could be with him. He could go to him and show himself and speak to him. But he couldn’t breathe a word of his reality behind the curtains. The betrayal would break Dean’s heart. In fact… It did. 

“Dean, you did this?” Castiel asked as Sam blinked blearily. The cuts and broken nose painted a vivid picture in the trails of blood of Dean’s furious fists slamming into his face. There was something wrong with Sam beyond his injuries on the surface. His temperature was normal, no virus lurked, no cold laid in wait. He was perfectly healthy except for the absence of his soul. 

“Cas, clean him up.” It was said with reluctance and distaste. Dean was worried and hurt, but there was no point in leaving Sam with his injuries. Castiel was as reluctant as Dean if not more so. He didn’t want to touch Sam again, not after the feeling of nothingness within the younger Winchester had hollowed Castiel out. 

He pressed his fingers to Sam’s forehead and sutured his wounds with what Dean called mojo and angels called grace. It felt cold and detached and Castiel wondered how he had missed Sam’s lack of soul before that moment, but hindsight bias is the only reason he can feel it then. 

“Dear Castiel, who art maybe running his ass away from Heaven, we pray that you have your ears on. So… Breaker, breaker…” Dean’s voice was distant and sounded as if it was coming through the crackled static of a radio with poor connection to a station. 

Castiel had expected the connection to suffer through the false reality jump that Balthazar had created for them, but he hadn’t counted on Dean praying to him. His heart ached to go and help him, but that would ruin the plan. He’d swallowed down the feeling and hoped Dean would give up on praying to him while he existed on the alternate plane. But when Dean did give up, it was a different kind of heartache, a longing at his core. 

Castiel had healed many. Becoming a miracle healer as Emmanuel when he had lost his memories and himself only made it so those who needed help received it. There were no prayers. Sometimes, he would hear a man’s voice, a single name coming through on his wavering voice: Cas. He hadn’t known he was an angel. He hadn’t known those were Dean’s prayers. He only knew that when he heard the other man, he wanted nothing more than to go to him, but had no idea who or where he was. 

_   
_ _ “It’s not. Trust me. It’s bloody. It’s corrupt. It’s not ‘pleasant’.” _

Dean had quickly become the most important being to Cas. He preferred the nickname, term of endearment, three-letter word. He preferred Dean's solutions to any of Heaven's. He found he was fond of Dean. He was close to him. He came to him when he called, watched over him to keep him safe when there were no orders to do so, and chose him over everyone and everything else. They took him and dropped him below the angels he used to outrank. 

Angels don’t often use violence against each other. Rather, it had been a rare occurrence before Dean Winchester was raised from Hell. Since then, angels had been killing each other, vying for their spot as the new God since their father seemingly abandoned them all, and they had resorted to torture for the angels who dared defy Heaven’s orders. 

Castiel was tortured. 

He had been pulled from his vessel by the celestial hands of his angry brothers and sisters. He had grown too fond of Dean. They could sense that his loyalty had strayed. They knew that he had begun to wonder if the very human feeling of love was something that he was able to feel… if the word accurately described how he felt for Dean despite the short time they had been together. He had ventured so far into this line of thought, that he had come to the conclusion that yes, he was in love with Dean Winchester while the angels of Heaven had decided that it was time he came to his senses and remember just how vacant he used to feel without that voice in his head, those eyes locked with his, and that name in his heart. 

Claws tore at the mark Dean had left on Castiel’s true form. Blows kept him down as he screamed. They couldn’t rip Dean Winchester away from him no matter how they tried. His wings beat fruitlessly as he tried to escape, tried to fly away.

“You serve Heaven. You don’t serve man. And you certainly don’t serve Dean Winchester.” The words were repeated as his wings were pulled down, his grace bursting with light as his celestial form burned with pain, and he was beaten into submission. He had curled in on himself, limp and seemingly resigned. 

He could still feel the wrath of Heaven rattling through him as he passed Dean, the threat to drag him back to Heaven by his wings like the disobedient angel he was hanging there, keeping his mind numb and his heart closed off. 

When Dean spoke, he turned even though it was a mistake. Their eyes locked and his heart jumped, sparking the warnings from Heaven. They were watching and he was aware of it. 

The words were forced from his mouth. He didn’t mean them, but he had to say them if he wanted any chance at remaining on Earth. “I learned my lesson while I was away, Dean,” Castiel had lied through his teeth. “I serve Heaven. I don’t serve man, and I certainly don’t serve you.” 

His heart cracked and he turned away, leaving Dean in a far safer position than he had previously. He was sorry. He regretted it. But he would live to do far worse, regret far more, and fall more in love with him than he had any right to. 

_ “We’re friends? … Am I Cas?”  _

Hello, Dean. 

The Castiel that Dean knew was gone and the only word in his mouth was Cas. 

_Castiel?  
_ _  
__Cas!_

_ Cas. _

_ Cas, I— _

_Cas!  
_ _  
__Cas?_

 _Castiel…  
_ _  
___Cas!

Cas had raised Dean from Hell, fallen in love with him, helped him, defied Heaven for him, died and resurrected for him, spied on him, betrayed him, and was found by him. He had done so much to hurt this fragile human. His memories flood back into him as the demons fall under his power. 

“I remember you.” He doesn’t know how he keeps his voice steady when he feels like he’s falling apart. Something flickers in Dean’s eyes, but Cas only wants to retreat. How can he even stand to look at him, let alone drive him halfway across the country? He is pulled in three directions. He wants to reach out to Dean. He wants to go inside, turning away from the man he loves to do as he was retrieved to do and save Sam. He wants to run away and stop himself from harming the ones he loves further. The one he loves further. “I remember everything.” 

“It’s better this way,” Cas promises Dean, though he’s sure it’s goodbye. “I’ll be fine.” 

Cas had been the one to lift Sam from Hell as an incomplete man, his soul left with Lucifer to be tortured. He had been the one to discover that his soul was missing too late, and he had been the one to break the wall that Death had placed in Sam’s mind to protect him from the horrors that his soul had barely survived. Now, he’s going to be the one to fix it. He can’t heal it as he once did with scratches and broken bones. He can take it on himself. After all, he deserves it. 

“If I can’t tell you again…” Cas says as he looks down at Sam, though his next words are directed at both Winchesters, “I’m sorry I ever did this to you.” 

His hand connects with Sam’s forehead. The room’s lights seem to shut off, plunging Cas into immediate darkness. He feels the heat in his palm. It’s scorching as it rips up his arm and devours the rest of him. Cruel laughter fills his head. Everything that happened to Sam in the cage flashes before Cas’ eyes like a movie made from a flipbook. Except, Sam isn’t the one undergoing the torture. Cas’ screams die in his throat as he suffocates on the memories that never belonged to him but plague him now.

He wants to cry for help; cry for Dean. He has no right to that name now. He’s done enough damage. It’s his turn to help. He has to take this burden from Sam. He has to take this pain, this fatigue, this crippling fear. He can do this. He can do this for Dean. 

Cas pulls his hand away from Sam and the lights slowly return. His muscles feel as if he’s been struck by high voltage. His wings feel singed. Cas shakes and forces himself to breathe through the pain. Though it is Lucifer on the bed, ready to cause irreparable damage to Cas, it is Dean beside him, repeating Cas’ name, worry in his eyes. 

How many times had he said “Hello, Dean,” and taken it for granted that he would be able to say it again and again for as long as Dean lived? 

Cas can’t speak, his throat squeezed shut by forces he logically knows aren’t real, but can’t seem to shake. He knows he saved Sam. He knows he helped Dean. He knows this is how he fixed things. He knows it’s the end. 

He can’t say it, though he wants to scream it as his fists beat at the windows. There’s no point in begging for help as he watches Sam and Dean leave the hospital, cured and reunited. All he can do is struggle against his restraints as tears stream down his cheeks, his torture begun. 

Goodbye, Dean. 


End file.
